I Am Living The Life Of My Dreams But I Am Not Happy

I was a very brilliant child when I was growing up. Because of this, I skipped a few classes along the way. This made me the youngest person in most of my classes. By the time I completed SHS, I was barely eighteen. I did very well in my WASSCE so I went to the university that same year. I was young but I had my life mapped out. “I won’t leave room for any distractions,” I told myself, “I will quietly attend this school and get my degree after four years, and then do my national service and land myself a good job. No girlfriend or love interest until I complete school and I am working.” I stuck to this plan and everything worked well for me. My life in school was smooth and I did well in my courses. When I got to my third year I continued to excel academically and I was so proud of everything I was accomplishing.

Then I got to my fourth year and life decided that it had different plans for me. Everything that could possibly go wrong went wrong. I failed two papers in my first semester. I was shocked. I had never failed an exam until then, so I never saw it coming. When I saw the results I believed it was a mistake so I went to my head of department to complain. They told me the results have already been uploaded so there was nothing they could do about it. I cried so much thinking about the fact that I had come all this way only to not graduate. In the end, I completed the course but I had two resits to write. After all that trouble, I took comfort in the knowledge that I would do my national service at an institution of my choice.

I applied to one of the mining organisations and I was selected. The training superintendent assured me that I had a position with them and the Human Resource Manager also sent me a letter of appointment. The day to report for my National Service arrived and the training superintendent said he didn’t know me. I showed him the letter I received from HR but it didn’t mean anything to him. After I pushed him for a while he told me, “If you want us to consider you then you have to go through an interview.” When I went for the interview I failed miserably. I was disheartened by the turn of events but not hopeless. The only thing I could think of was one organization I interned with. When I worked with them I gave them my all. I was only an intern but I worked harder than their employees. So the management really loved me. So in my lowest moment, I turned to them with the hope that they would accept me to do my national service in their organization. However, they turned me away.

During those times I was preparing to write my two resit exams. In November of that year, I managed to get into an organization for my national service, and I also went back to school to write my exams. Unfortunately, I failed those exams too. I am not exaggerating when I say that I nearly went mad. I tried to understand why something like this was happening to me but I didn’t have any answers. All I had was frustration. I almost lost my faith in Allah. I kept asking Him, “I pray five times every day. I don’t miss a single moment of prayers or fasting, so why do you allow me to suffer like this?” After the national service ended, I was back to square one. I had no job or prospects seeing as I didn’t have a degree. All I could boast of was frustration, depression, and overthinking.

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I sat at home for the entire year and went to resit the papers again. This time around I passed but I couldn’t even jubilate. I was just too mentally drained to feel any joy. I never imagined that it would take me six years to finish a four-year degree. The next year I started applying for intern positions so I could gain some experience in the job market. But nothing fruitful came out of them. My mother and my sister did not offer me the comfort I needed from my family. All they did was complain about the fact that I didn’t have a job. So I always left home at 8:00 AM and returned at night. I often left the house with no destination in mind. I just wanted to go somewhere I would get peace of mind. I continued doing this until I found a man on social media who offered me an internship opportunity.

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When I had an interview with this man, we negotiated and agreed on the money he would pay me. But when I was about to start work he told me that the boss can’t pay me that money because I am inexperienced. So they decided to pay me GHC27.39 every day. It wasn’t good enough but was better than nothing so I accepted it. I started the work and realized the people were looking for cheap labour but I didn’t quit because it helped me to escape from my mother and my sister’s constant insults. I did the internship for four months and then I landed a well-paying job. The job comes with a lot of allowances and benefits. This is the dream I worked so hard to achieve, but now that I have it I am not happy.

I have not been medically diagnosed but I know that I am suffering from depression. My mood is always down and it has gotten worse to the extent that my work colleagues have started gossiping about me. I have been talking to myself sometimes. It’s mostly unconscious. I do it at the office when I become unaware of myself. I am slowly losing it and I know I don’t deserve this. I am trying to be okay and I should be happier now that life is good. I went through so much for two years and now that I am financially stable in life, this is what I am going through. I don’t understand any of it.